Pink Saturday

Heya,

Well I just got done dj'ing for approx 10,000 people.  No joke.  Apparently the whole event had around 100,000.  Guestimations place around 10 of those at our stage.  Fucking unbelievable event.  People were just jumping and screaming and smiling and laughing and loving life.  I am so honored and humbled to be able to be in a position to give them my energy, my love, my music.  It really is sacred and I take it very seriously and with much gratitude and respect.  I definitely play it up for people, take off my shirt and give em a show and all that.  But for me, it's not about ego (as Harvey Milk says in the song) it's about giving people hope and love and smiles and energy and fun.  It's about celebrating life and I am just celebrating it right along with them.  So, thank you for the opportunity to do this, divine universe.  I am grateful to be here, putting out positive vibes and celebrating life and love - especially in this urban environment we call home.  There is a lot of hardship in this world, and when we can put that all aside for a moment and live and dance side by side, well isn't that just what life is all about?

Boom!

Mastering

Another big day.  Really cool though because I did my very first mastering session today with Greg @ Pyramind.  He sat down with me in the "Vault" [pro tools hd room  - freaking proper studio!!!]  and we went through the Harvey Milk track and mastered it together.  I learned a bunch of techniques and it was a very cool opportunity for me to sit down with the head of our school and get a private mastering tutorial.  Veryyyyy cool :)

Now just gearing up for the big weekend.  Still a bunch to do, need to test my live set and I still don't even really have my dj sets ready.  Could be that I just do it "on the fly" style which can be cool in it's own way since you can improvise and go with the inspiration of the moment.  Sometimes thought it's nice to have it all mapped out so you can just roll through it and spend time between mixes working the crowd not stressin the next track.....  we'll see.  I get some time tomorrow so I should be able to get a general playlist put together then.

Not much help coming from other people on the setup but sometimes it just goes that way.  Somehow though John and I always manage to pull it off.  I swear, we are a two man army sometimes, lol.  And he is leaving town monday so I'm getting stuck with all the rental returns!  haha, that's alright though, I get at least the experience of dj'ing for over 5,000 people.  So if I have to return a generator and some equipment in exchange, it's not a bad deal :)  Seriously have 2 of the best dj gigs of the year coming up this weekend AND the live set to boot.  It's just crazy!  It really does pour when it rains!  

Alright, time for sleeping!  Big weekend ahead.  Good times, San Francisco, good times and goodnight.

<3

June 27...the insane weekend approaches!

Alright, first blog.  Popin the cherry right here, right now.  It's about time :)

The purpose of this blog will be more or less to focus on the work that I am doing.  It shall serve as a place for me to document all of the efforts I am putting forth, so that I can track progress, share with others and have something to look back on.  

I am very heavily involved in a lot of projects right now.  The main thing at this moment are my performances this weekend.  I am DJ'ing twice for San Francisco Pride - once Sat night in the Castro and once downtown on Sunday.  I am also performing live on Pride mainstage sunday.  It is an original song incorporated with an audio recording of Harvey Milk.  It is a tribute to him and the song will be performed by myself on piano and "unwoman" on cello.

These are 3 of the biggest gigs of the year, all in one weekend.  I have never performed live before so there has been a lot of work going into the preparation of this piece.  Unfortunately I don't seem to have nearly as much time as I would like as there are other things taking up my time as well.  Between school and work and trying to work on my own career as a full time job I become quite busy quite quickly.  It is a good thing as I am accomplishing a TON, I just need to make sure I can balance it out with enough sleep ;-)

Speaking of, perhaps I should pass out soon.  This is just a starter to get things going.  Today was good though.  I managed to get into the studio with Dave Earl aka SF Logic Ninja to get some final advice on the mix of the Harvey Milk piece.  He liked it and said it should definitely be ready for mastering tomorrow.  That was good news because I have had to go back and change it now so many times and it's nice to have the mix solid.  So yea, tomorrow Greg Gordon, the man behind my school, Pyramind, will be doing the mastering on this piece personally.  Quite an honor I must say.  In fact my whole school has been SO supportive on this project and it has definitely led to it sounding the way it does now.  They also let me record the cello in their Pro Tools HD room with killer mics!  It now sounds super sweet :)

Oh and I got word today that my website is getting worked on, that's sweet.  www.liamshy.com coming soon!

Ciao for now,

Liam Shy